


Overload

by dare_to_do_our_duty



Series: Lawyer, Vigilante, and Occasional Avenger [3]
Category: Daredevil (TV), The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: And gets some well deserved respect, Gen, foggy is the BEST friend, migraines, overload, super senses
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-26
Updated: 2015-09-26
Packaged: 2018-04-23 10:41:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,273
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4873687
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dare_to_do_our_duty/pseuds/dare_to_do_our_duty
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bruce walks in to find Matt curled up on the couch, hands clamped over his ears.<br/>So he calls Foggy.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Overload

Bruce was on his way to the kitchen, hopefully to eat a full pan of meatloaf, when he saw Matt Murdock on the couch. The lawyer vigilante was curled up in a ball that looked almost painful and his hands were clamped over his ears clearly with as much force as he could muster, his face pressed into a pillow. His eyebrows (all Bruce could see of his face) were scrunched down. Bruce carefully took a couple steps toward the miserable huddle of young man. “Matt?”

Matt didn’t really respond, just made a little sound that could almost be construed as a whimper, except that Matt never whimpered. “Not good,” Bruce muttered to himself. “Matt? What’s wrong?”

This time, Matt worked up enough energy to lift his face a little off the pillow and mumble in Bruce’s general direction. “Foggy. On my phone.” And he dropped back down, hands even more tightly over his ears.

It wasn’t hard to work out what he meant and it only took the physicist a moment to locate Matt’s phone, which had slid off the couch and landed just under the edge of the coffee table. He scooped it up and tapped it, dialing speed dial one “Foggy” when it popped up. “Matt! I know it’s the weekend, but where the hell are you? Karen and I --”

“Mr Nelson. Uh, Foggy.” Bruce interrupted.

“Woah, you’re not Matt. Where is he and why do you have his phone?”

“Foggy, it’s Bruce Banner. We just got back from a little spat just out of Manhattan an hour ago and now Matt’s curled up on the couch with his hands over his ears and he won’t talk to me.” Bruce laid it out as fast as he could.”

“Jesus. I’ll be there in half an hour. How loud was it? The fight.” 

“Pretty loud,” Bruce admitted. 

“Did he get hit on the head or anything?” 

Bruce thought for a moment. “I don’t think so but I was… not me, so it’s a little unclear. I’ll ask the others.”

“Okay, just try to keep it quiet until I get there and don’t make it really smelly or anything.” 

“Okay. JARVIS will let you up when you come.” Bruce hung up the phone and set it by Matt’s head, moving towards the hallway and away from the other man. “JARVIS, connect me to the others, please? Quietly?”

There was a second of hesitation before the AI responded. “You are now connected, Dr Banner.”

“Did anyone see Matt get hit on the head during the battle?” 

“Bruce? What’s wrong?” Natasha’s voice filtered through fastest; she seemed to have a (very small) soft spot for the blind lawyer.

“He’s up here on the assemble floor, hands over his ears and totally curled up on the couch. And he’s not very responsive. He had me call Foggy and he’s on his way here, but he wanted to know if Matt got hit or not.”

“I didn’t see anything,” Steve said, “But I could have missed it.”

“Neither did JARVIS and I,” Tony added.

“But you know that the Devil would not have told us if he was indeed injured?” Thor rumbled. “He holds his wounds close to his heart.” 

There was a general hum of agreement; Matt did have a tendency to hide his injuries. “Okay. Thanks, guys. Foggy just wanted to know and I said I’d ask.” 

“Wait!” Steve called. “Should we come up?” 

“You can if you want,” Bruce said. “But you better be quiet.”

A moment later, the elevators dinged open and Bruce had to fight a laugh; it was crammed with the entire Avenger Initiative, not including himself. Natasha let out a quiet breath at the lump on the couch that was Matt. Bruce went back to the couch, kneeling next to the lawyer. “Hey, Matt. I’m just gonna…” He reached out to run a hand through the lawyer’s hair, looking for bleeding or bruises. But the moment his hand got within a few centimeters of Matt, the younger man flinched, letting out a small startled sound. 

That almost scared Bruce more than the posture; it apparently hurt for them to be very close to Matt, he didn’t hear or register or feel that Bruce’s hand was getting close to him, or apparently that Bruce was there at all.

And so they sat without moving for twenty minutes or so until JARVIS quietly announced “Mr Nelson is on his way up.” A moment later, the elevator doors opened and Foggy rushed in, wearing a work suit and carrying a backpack. He flipped it around as he crossed the room, unzipping the biggest pocket and pulling out a pair of well-insulated headphones. There was a moment as he took in the scene; Bruce kneeling by the head of a curled up Matt, Avengers crammed silently into the kitchen space.

But then he was next to the couch and carefully reaching out. “Matty?” Foggy asked quietly. And somehow his voice must have gotten through when Bruce’s didn’t because Matt didn’t flinch when the bigger man’s fingers gently pushed Matt’s hand’s off of his ears and slid the headphones down over them. Steve could see Matt visibly relax a little at the further reduction of sound.

Foggy ran his hands through Matt’s hair and they came out clean; no blood or swollen bumps. “Okay. Stark, we’re going to need a bed with silk sheets. Matt, can you get up?”

Matt started to haul himself off the couch, but the moment he was on his feet, the lawyer swayed and Foggy had to duck under his arm to keep him from falling back onto the couch. “ ‘m fine.”

Foggy managed not to look incredulous. “Fine, like the time in college you got pneumonia and passed out in your third to last Torts class and they had to call an ambulance and me because I was your medical contact? Or fine like the time when you got beaten up in an alley just before Christmas and I had to explain to my parents when we got there for holiday?”

“Told you I was sorry about that.” Matt muttered belligerently. “A bunch of times.” 

Foggy smiled to mask his concern over Matt’s slipping diction, waving Thor over to help him support the shaky man. They followed Steve out of the main living area and down the hall to a spare room where Tony and Natasha were quickly replacing the previous sheets and blankets with a silk set. “Here,” Tony said as he and the spy pulled up the last blanket. 

“Great. Can you bring the room temperature up?” Tony nodded and gestured to JARVIS while Thor and Foggy carefully set Matt on the edge of the bed, bending down to pull off his socks. “Candles. In my bag,” he directed at Steve, who obeyed without question. There were indeed candles, half a dozen small jars of vanilla scented wax. The super soldier found the lighter buried in the bottom of the bag and started lighting them, the light scent wafting around the room.

As the room slowly started to warm up, Foggy stood and tapped Matt lightly on a shoulder to get his attention. Matt’s eyes lifted and landed in his general direction, forehead still creased tightly. “I’m going to take off the headphones for a second so I can get your shirt off, okay?”

Matt nodded and closed his eyes again, letting Foggy pull off the noise canceling headphones. The entire team could see and hear his breathing quicken as the barrier between the outside noise and his overly sensitive ears vanished. Quickly, his best friend pulled off the t-shirt that Matt was wearing, both lawyers wincing as the two or three seemingly ever-present cuts and bruises on Matt’s torso were revealed. Foggy said nothing, only handed Matt the headphones and carefully started to work off Matt’s pants, leaving him only in his boxers. The vigilante was clearly past the point of embarrassment, using slightly trembling hands to slide the headphones back over his ears and bringing one palm down to scrub at his mouth and nose like a young child.

“Done.” Foggy laid the sweatpants over a chair on top of the shirt. “Get in the bed.” He reached out and guided one of Matt’s hands over the edge of the bed, locating one of the pillows. Matt didn’t even argue as Foggy nudged him back into the bed and pulled the blankets up. 

“Are you going to take something? And don’t give me the ‘It’ll only make me dizzy” crap because clearly it can’t get much worse.” Matt made yet another sound that was fairly uninterpretable, but Foggy clearly understood the intent and threw his hands up in the air. “Fine. But if I come back in an hour and you’re still awake and doing the forehead scrunch thing--” he made a vague motion at Matt’s forehead “--you’re taking something.”

Matt didn’t argue, just closed his eyes. Foggy sighed and touched Matt’s shoulder before scooping up his bag and walking out of the room, followed by the other Avengers.

He settled on the same couch that had held Matt fifteen minutes ago, pulling off the suit jacket he was wearing and laying it down with his backpack on the large coffee table. “So.” Steve, who had disappeared ten minutes earlier, came out of the kitchen with a tray. He set it on the table and picked up one of the mugs to hand to Foggy. “Thanks.” The lawyer took a sip of the drink, shoulders drooping and keeping his eyes on the hall door leading to where they had deposited his partner.

“So.” Foggy repeated. “What happened?”

Bruce took a deep breath and headed off the story, describing their fairly noisy battle with the villain of the week just outside of the city, their return to the tower, and his discovery of Matt on the couch nearly an hour ago. When he finished, Foggy ran a hand over his face. “Yeah, it happens.” 

He drained the end of his coffee and emerged from the coffee cup to find the Avengers staring at him with various degrees of interest. “So why… what… the candles?” Tony Stark (Tony Stark!!! in Foggy’s head) asked him.

“We use them a lot. Having one scent to focus on specifically makes it easier for him to block out the rest of the input. Same with the silk sheets; easier on his skin, less for him to feel, smooth. Even things like cotton are hard when you’re overstimulated. Taste, nothing we can really do about it, or smell, short of a clothespin. But sound is usually the worst.” He leaned back in the chair, running one hand through his long hair. “It’s, uh, been happening since our college days. Did he tell you we went to undergrad and law school together?”

There was a round of head shaking. “Yeah, we were roommates. And even then, he would get migraines and whatever or some days would just be really bad. Even before I knew about the whole--” he made a hand gesture that was taken to mean “Daredevil” “--There’s just so much sensory information for him to process and it gets overwhelming for him to try to sort it all out. Plus he doesn’t like taking medication so that doesn’t help.” 

Bruce seemed to be taking notes. “He doesn’t like medication?”

Foggy shook his head. “No. He says they make him feel like he’s underwater. And he relies too much on his other senses to compensate for the blindness to willingly let them be muted.”

The physicist sighed. “Good to know.” 

Foggy stood. “Is there something to eat that’s as organic as possible? Cause he can also taste chemicals and all that.”

Steve led Foggy into the kitchen and started pulling items out of the cupboards at JARVIS’ direction, Foggy examining each package as it appeared. He checked his watch; “I’ll be right back, I’m just going to go…”

His footsteps echoed down the hall and the door to Matt’s room clicked open. A few minutes passed but he came back, looking self-satisfied. “He’s asleep. Thank God.”

Just then, his cell phone beeped at him. “Crap.” The lawyer rolled back down his sleeves, pulled back on his suit jacket, and neatly folded the collar. “I’ve got to go meet Landman and Zack about a lawsuit. Make sure he eats when he wakes up.”

Foggy grabbed his backpack, moved Matt’s cell phone and glasses from the floor to the coffee table, and headed for the elevator. “Foggy.” Barton called. “Thanks for the visit.” The other returned the grin and the sloppy salute. 

“Anytime.” He caught the elevator doors, preventing their complete close. “Also, remind Matt that we go to court tomorrow and I would like to not have to explain why my partner has black eyes or broken ribs or anything.”

MDDM

Foggy was pleasantly surprised when, four hours later, he got a text message from an unknown number simply reading Matt awake, much better. Bruce making him eat. -SR

SR could only be Steve Rogers; not only was Matt good, he, Foggy Nelson, now had the cell phone number of an Avenger!

(He continued to be surprised for the next month or so as he got messages from various Avengers pertaining to the rooms they seemed to be setting up for Matt at the tower; clarification on the types of bedding, carpeting, scents for the bathroom…

He was amused when one of Stark’s text messages mentioned that there would be a guest room for him as well. Since he was Matt’s handler.)

**Author's Note:**

> Hey everyone! I just wanted to thank you for your comments and kudos, they mean a lot! I am still accepting ideas if you have anything you want to see.


End file.
